SPRINGFIELD – Michael Flatley’s “Lord of the Dance” troupe was to be the remedy for an ailing bottom line at CityStage and Springfield Symphony Hall.

The shows slated for May 6 and 7 at Symphony Hall will cost CityStage $126,000 and have a “gross potential” of earning $196,000 if every seat in the 2,611-seat theater is sold at full price. Even figuring in discounts and a few empty seats, the nonprofit was looking at a nice payday, said Cynthia J. Anzalotti, president of CityStage and Symphony Hall.

“We always do great with them,” she said.

But then Anzalotti started seeing ads for “Lord of the Dance” at the Mohegan Sun casino in Uncasville, Conn. May 9 where tickets will cost $20 a seat.

The cheapest Anzalotti can sell tickets to the show for is $25 for the cheapest seats and $58 to 459 for the best seats.

“I have to let people know that this is an example of what happens,” she said. “There are people who said they would work with us.”

Anzalotti and others who run similar performing arts venues around the state fear competition for both acts and patrons from a proposed Palmer casino. She’s asking state lawmakers, who plan to take up casino legislation later in March, to cap the size of any theater at a Palmer casino at 300.

CityStage seats 479.

The Mohegan Tribal Gaming Authority, which also operates Mohegan Sun, has proposed a 2,500-seat theater in the $875 million to $900 million casino along with 4,000 slot machines and 150 table games and 600 hotel rooms.

“It’ll be a multi-use room, said Paul I . Brody, vice president of development for the Mohegan Tribal Gaming Authority. “Everything is conceptual at this point.”

The casino hopes to bring in a diverse roster of entertainment including modern rock and country and western, Brody said.

But Anzalotti said Casinos have a very different business model from theaters that depend on ticket sales and rentals to outside promoters pay their bills. Symphony Hall has a $2.1 million annual budget, she said.

“Casinos don’t book acts to make money. They do it to draw people,” Anzalotti said. “Then once you are in there, there are no clocks, no windows.”

David W. Fleming, executive director of The Colonial Theatre in Pittsfield, used to book bluesman B.B. King for $50,000 at a theater he managed in Green Bay, Wisc. King was sure to draw a sellout crowd. That’s until the Indian casino opened up across town.

“The casino said ‘We’ll see your $50,000 and raise your $25,000’,” Fleming said. “Booking agents get what they can where they can get it. There won’t be any discussion. The acts just won’t be available.”

Anzalotti said Symphony hall has already missed out on Jerry Seinfeld and “blue collar” comedian Ron White because proximity clauses in their casino contracts that keep them from appearing elsewhere in the region.

Brody said the Mohegans could use its booking power to help bring acts to existing area venues and the Authority already have marketing partnerships with Connecticut attractions like Mystic Seaport and Mystic Aquarium and Institute for Exploration.

“Look, we’ve been very conscious of the fact that we have a rich cultural area in Springfield,” Brody said. “We are not looking to compete with the major assets in Springfield,” he said.

Back in the 1990s, casino proposals called for money from a casino project that never happened to be set aside for the arts.

Anzalotti said she’d be wary of a similar arrangement.

“But that can be written in and it might never happen,” “The taxes for the hotels were supposed to go to the arts. I haven’t seen that happen.”

State Sen. Stephen J. Buoniconti, D-West Springfield, said now, before a casino bill is even before lawmakers, is the time to put regulations and restrictions in place to protect local communities. The plan is to have a bill in the House later this month.

“When we were talking about a local casino in Western Massachusetts, the hope was that we weren’t going to hurt downtown Springfield,” Buoniconti said. “Downtown has enough challenges.”